


Antiphon

by ClockworkCourier



Category: The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Backstory, Blood and Gore, Canon-Typical Violence, Crusades, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Historical, Historical Accuracy, M/M, Medieval Medicine, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Pre-Canon, Pre-Relationship, Religious Conflict, Religious Imagery & Symbolism, Slow Build, Slow Burn, Temporary Character Death, War
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-22
Updated: 2020-07-22
Packaged: 2021-03-05 04:07:29
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 697
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25448101
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ClockworkCourier/pseuds/ClockworkCourier
Summary: A call and response song, started by a source and echoed by another in refrain.Nicolo's story starts before the First Crusade.
Relationships: Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova, Other Relationship Tags to Be Added
Comments: 10
Kudos: 55





	Antiphon

**Author's Note:**

> hi yeah i'm a history major and the old guard came and hit me like a meteorite. i've spent the past nine days jumping between libraries (safely!) and watching documentaries to brush up on my crusades history. i wanted to write the closest thing to a historically accurate joe/nicky thing because i love THEM and i love EVERYTHING. not that i think an expert on 11th century warfare is going to be reading this, but just in case, if there are any errors please let me know (my specialty is maritime history so i beg yer forgiveness). :D everything will be sourced as needed! 
> 
> also, post-prologue, chapters will probably individually range between 10k to 20k depending on stuff like battles and whatnot. yeehaw!

It’s midday. The sun is at its zenith above the dusty battlefield and the broken jaws of Jerusalem’s walls, flies buzzing above corpses with their rot quickening in the heat. Carrion turn wide, anticipatory circles in the sky, their only obstacle being the labor of abundant choice. In itself, the battlefield is a merchant’s paradise of clothing of exotic make—shredded fabrics of silk and wool, spangled in dyes rare and precious; an armory of gilded iron, steel, bronze, copper, silver; gemstones on hilts of swords and on sacred totems and badges marking those faithful and secure in their wealth. Here is the ruby blood, the ivory bone and tooth, the pearl and carmine and porphyry of exposed muscle and rendered flesh. A well-stocked market with a staggering price.  
  
Most of the survivors have moved on, although some remain in frozen positions of broken limbs and paralyzing agony. Their groans of pain are lost in the noonday wind, sacred music carried to the uncaring heavens. Nicolo lays among them, on his back with his sunburnt face turned toward the cloudless sky. His eyes track an enormous bird weaving a gyre above him, the sun catching its gold and bronze feathers. He wonders—however idly—if the angels in heaven take the form of birds rather than men. What is more accurate than a being built to soar above the stinking masses taking humans piece by piece to the maker?  
  
He turns his head, seeing the prone form of a dead man beside him.  
  
The man is—  
  
 _Was_ Onesto da Venezia. A proud, grinning mountain of a man with broken teeth lined up like ruined pottery. He had a head over most of the men in their company, his hulking form a constant beacon through the mountain snowstorms and relentless sand-flecked winds. He prayed as though asking a question rather than beseeching the Almighty, always ending his sentences on upward lilts— “Have mercy upon me, a sinner?” “Fill my heart not with temptation, but with the pursuit of grace?”  
  
And now, he is a bloated, purple-red mass, eyes open and full of haze, lips parted with blood crusted on his broken teeth and split skin. A single fly crawls over his open left eye, down to his nose where it rests halfway into his nostril. Nicolo watches in tired, weary fascination, then looks up to see another fly perch upon the fletching of the arrow sticking out of the back of Onesto’s skull.  
  
Then, the telltale sound of shifting armor.  
  
Nicolo doesn’t have to look. He hasn’t had to the last two times. Leather and metal and the soft sigh of torn fabric. A grunt. A groan.  
  
There is a dagger beside Nicolo’s neck, its swirled metal blade crusted with brown blood— _his_ blood. An hour ago, it was plunged to its hilt into his throat. He felt it go through his windpipe, a surprisingly dull pain; it was more like choking than stabbing. He had tried to swallow around it, breathe through its cold obstruction. His tongue tasted bitterness, the tang of metal, the chill of something oncoming and fatal. Now, it’s just another piece of the market, something used and left behind for someone who can use it.  
  
For someone who can die.  
  
The man who killed him gets up again, and Nicolo closes his eyes, waiting for the next blow.  
  
What do they call a man who does not die? Is he considered sacred, as death is taken from him in the manner of Christ? Or is he profane, unable to savor the delights of Heaven, as the Devil marks him deathless? He has not learned the art of permanent death, or perhaps has forgotten how to do it. And the man who kills Nicolo is a similar student—he lacks what must apparently be known in the way of dying. It does not matter if his heart is cut from his chest, his skull cleaved open to the root, or dashed to shards under a rock. He does not die. _They_ do not die.  
  
Nicolo does not know what he is, or what he’s done to deserve this.  
  
By the fourth death, he weeps.

**Author's Note:**

> [Tumblr](http://radiojamming.tumblr.com)


End file.
